


Waiting for Zuko

by sarcasm_for_free



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Character Study, Earth Kingdom (Avatar), F/M, Fire Nation (Avatar), Firelord Zuko (Avatar), Fluff, Gen, Hair, Humor, Nervousness, POV Multiple, Past Relationship(s), Post-Canon, Waiting Rooms, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, and after some consideration, two out of three, war reparations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:29:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarcasm_for_free/pseuds/sarcasm_for_free
Summary: Welcome to the Fire Nation Royal Palace’s waiting hall, where innocent Earth Kingdom citizens break out in a cold sweat because why the hell would the new Fire Lord want to talk to them?(Mai would like to know, too.)
Relationships: Jin & Song (Avatar), Jin/Zuko (Avatar), Lee & Zuko (Avatar), Mai/Zuko (Avatar), Song/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 76
Kudos: 495





	1. Jin

**Author's Note:**

> A little finger exercise I did between working on my two Avatar fics in the making when I felt stuck on a scene, and guess what, it’s the first fic of the bunch to get finished. Go figure :D
> 
> The chapters are of varying lengths, but they are all nicely ficlet sized, so I should be able to post them every other day.
> 
> Title’s a nod to _Waiting for Godot_ ;P

Jin was absolutely fine with not knowing, totally happy with guessing, and really okay with pretending to misunderstand what was going on.

She had turned a blind eye to the wanted posters all around the city before it had been conquered by the Fire Nation, had ignored the tea server’s little lamp trick in exchange for pure bliss, had played deaf to the rumors in the following months, and nowadays grinned, eye-rolling, at the people who attempted to give her their condolences or best wishes, depending on their national background, for what they thought they knew about her relationships.

Ba Sing Se was a gossip pit, and she was the latest fodder for the lion-tigers. Getting away for a bit was a nice change. The reason, though...

The gold tiled floor felt cold under her threadbare slippers and the resulting chill clashed with the smell of exotic hot spices wafting through the hallway, and which tickled her nose. She was beginning to think she was allergic to the Fire Nation as a whole because she felt itchy and runny-nosed since setting foot on its soil for the first time.

The letter had come last week, summoning her to an audience with the _Fire Lord_. The new Fire Lord, who’d just ended a war and still took the time to write to lowly Earth Kingdom citizens like it was a perfectly sensible thing to do. Like he knew her and felt bad for what had happened, on a personal level, and Jin bought every word from that damned letter, hook, line and sinker.

She _had_ been fine with pretending to know nothing.

The enormous door in front of her opened. “Fire Lord Zuko is now ready to receive you in the throne room.”

She was so not ready to see Lee again.

Playing dumb had been easier.


	2. Song & Lee

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There isn’t a tag for Song & Lee, so I’ll stick with their Zuko relationship tags since the core of this ficlet is their connection to him.

The chair next to Song squeaked as a scrawny boy scrambled onto it and the guard, who’d led him in and then showed the kid’s anxiously hovering parents back out, vanished into the throne room.

The boy dangled his legs over the seat’s edge, swinging them back and forth. His clothing was even less appropriate for a meeting with someone of high rank than her own, Song noticed. She’d been given barely any time to buy something new for the occasion, which meant going at least three towns over to find a seamstress, but she had made do with the help of her mother. Her clothes were clean, free of wrinkles and carefully stitched around the hem. In comparison, the child to her right looked like he’d rolled in mud before coming here. It made Song feel a heady mix of relief to not be the worst dressed person in the room and shame that the thought had even entered her mind. It wasn’t the boy’s fault.

No one from a small Earth Kingdom village, a poor village at that, would have ever dreamed of being asked to the Fire Palace, not after the war’s end, at least. Before, a visit to the Caldera had meant execution or prison, now it meant– well, before was before and things wouldn’t transpire the same way now as they had back then.

“Are you here to see the Fire Lord, too?” a high voice asked, accompanied by a whistle through pre-adolescent tooth gaps. The boy turned his dirt-streaked face to her.

Instinctively, Song patted down her hanbok for a handkerchief.

“Yes, I am.” She finally found the little square of white cloth and held it out to her companion. “Take this, please. You have a bit of dirt on your cheeks,” she smiled.

The boy started to furiously scrub at the grime with equally grubby fingers, earth stuck under his nails. Farmer’s boy, then, probably born and raised as far from any big city as she’d been.

“Here, let me.” She carefully extended her hand, slowly, so she wouldn’t spook him. “I’m Song.”

Ceasing to make the mess worse, the kid let his hands drop and sent her a ridiculous grin. “Hello, Song, I’m Lee,” he said and Song felt a pang of sadness.

She had encountered three Lees since a scarred teenager going by the same name had stolen her ostrich horse and she still flinched and gazed longingly into the distance every time she heard the name spoken aloud. It drove her mother up the wall.

Song swallowed and sent the newest Lee a tremulous smile. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said through wobbly lips and guided the handkerchief to the traces of dirt now rubbed all over his beaming face. For a moment, she considered spitting into the cloth to make it easier to get the mud off, like her mother had done when Song had been a child, but little Lee was still a stranger (like, in the end, every other Lee had been), so she just proceeded to rub his cheeks in a circular motion, albeit harder.

When the last smudges were gone, Song folded the hanky neatly in half, the now beige side turned inwards, and stuffed it back into her sleeve.

“Thanks,” the kid chirped, happily. For some reason, he was less frightened to be here than his parents. What did he know that they didn’t, that she didn’t, and could he teach her how to stop shaking?

“It was my pleasure,” Song laughed, her eyes closing for a second.

Barely a minute of silence went by before Lee opened his mouth again.

“Do you think the new Fire Lord holds grudges, like the mean one before him?” He stopped swinging his legs and Song wished he would start again because she’d enjoyed the fear-free atmosphere. Someone had to not be weak in the knees in the face of a chat with the leader of an ex-enemy nation. And it sure wasn’t going to be her.

Maybe the kid wasn’t as carefree as she’d hoped.

She sighed. No reason to needlessly frighten him. After all, executions were pretty unlikely, and practically non-existent, thanks to the current political climate.

“I don’t know, but I don’t think a mean man would pay reparations to the people the second the war ended.”

“Repa-what?”

Song’s mouth twitched. “Reparation. It means making up for something you caused, for something not fair, like loss or harm.”

“Oh,” Lee whispered. “Is that why we not only got food for the next months but also got my brother back earlier from war than the barker said?”

Somewhere a door was creaking, the sound echoing between the walls.

Trying to be as quiet as possible, Song whispered, “I think so. We also were sent food, money, and two animals.” Two ostrich horses, to be precise. But since her neighbors had received two moo-sows, she tried to pay no mind to this coincidence. Which it was, a coincidence.

Another door creaked, this time the one in front of their chairs.

“The Fire Lord would like to see you now, Miss Song.”

She could lie to herself all she wanted, but the letter asking for someone from her village to be present at the Fire Nation court had been addressed to her house, to “Song and her mother”, as had the burn salve. Too many coincidences to ignore.

Song slowly walked to the guard’s side, her burn marks suddenly aching, but as she was about to step past him, she heard Lee pipe up.

“Hey, Song,” he called.

She tilted her head in his direction, trying to smile once more at the kid, who stared at her unwaveringly. “Yes?”

“Never give up without a fight,” he told her.

Song steeled herself and nodded, first at Lee, then at the guard.

Now, she was ready.


	3. Mai & Zuko

Mai watched from the sidelines as the cabbage merchant, who’d almost kissed Zuko’s boots in gratitude for his new cart, and who looked suspiciously familiar to her, kowtowed out of the room.

The guards closed the door behind him with an air of relief.

She could sympathize.

After hours of audiences with Earth Kingdom nobodies, Zuko had surely hit his limit for self-flagellation.

The groan Zuko let loose as he ripped his crown and then the hair tie from his head and put them on the armrest of his throne signaled at least a break.

While he roughly massaged his scalp, which had withstood the tight topknot all day, Mai glided closer to drawl into his ear.

“Tell me this was the last one.” The list she could spy on the throne’s other armrest told her that her hopes were in vain. The wide sleeve of Zuko’s robes on top of the crumpled paper to conceal its contents, only half of the names crossed out, was a useless maneuver on his part.

Mai studied her nails with affected nonchalance. “You fulfilled the most pressing needs of your own nation, ticked every check-box on the Water Tribe’s greedy little list of overblown demands, and now your’re so done with the Earth Kingdom, you’re discussing cabbage recipes with old men. All in a month’s time.” Looking up from her gleaming nail polish, she asked, deadpan, “Are you finally done playing the martyr? Or do you want to send the Avatar a ‘sorry my people killed your people’ compensation present first?”

Zuko squinted, brows knit. “Do you think Aang could use a new saddle for Appa?”

Lightning quick, Mai wacked her stupidly noble boyfriend over the head with his discarded headpiece. The pointed ends of the golden flame tangled in his hair and therefore, of course, had to become stuck in the unruly mop. It hung, cradled by a nest of black strands, awkwardly on Zuko’s left side near his mangled ear.

With a bit of creativity, they could make it work as some kind of stand-in ear jewelry. She’d have to see if the maids could track down a second Fire Lord insignia, make it a matching set.

Crossing her arms, she stared Zuko down. 

“Isn’t it time for you to stop groveling?” There was a bit more emotion in her voice than she’d intended, but he was taxing beyond belief today and really starting to wind her up. “You ended a war,” she jabbed her finger at him, “paid reparations to every populated nation for things you did not even do, negotiated treaties with the other nations and now you’ve invited peasants from dirt poor Earth villages to the palace to shock them into cardiac arrest by begging their forgiveness for I don’t know what. When will it finally be enough?”

It didn’t help that half the people Zuko felt the need to apologize to were fairly pretty girls his age and that his apologies contained various insinuations about something more between them. At any rate, the girls all flushed – part glowing with satisfaction, part cringing at the awkwardness – when Zuko blathered on, red as a cherry-apple himself, about breaking their trust and his untoward behavior, which in Zuko speak could mean anything, from stealing fruit to feeling up one’s bum by accident. What had the idiot been doing while they were apart, started a harem?

The following sigh from Zuko spoke volumes. Half-hearted, he tugged at the crown, grunting when it became even more snarled in his hair. Giving up, he slumped back into his much too hard throne. The last twenty Fire Lords hadn’t been comfortable there, so why should he. Call her petty, but Mai thought it was a sweet deal. Power over a whole nation, but a sore bottom for eternity. Sounded fair to her.

“It will never be _enough_ , Mai,” Zuko said, softly. “You saw how frightened they all were.”

Yes, empirically, the peasants were jittery and close to hyperventilating when they were led in, but their panic attacks always stopped the moment Zuko opened his mouth and was so...Zuko.

“But if doing what must be done bores you that much, you’re free to go,” he said, off-handedly, and sank even lower in his seat.

She was about to poke a few holes into him with her new knife set – _her_ guilt present from him for being thrown in jail – when he continued.

“Someone around here should be free to go and do what they want.” He kept on sighing, this time so deep and weary of the world, he rattled the headpiece, even made it swing, with a strong exhalation.

“Stop pouting.” Mai breached the last bit of distance between them and slipped her pinky into the tangle of hair at the base of the headpiece, wiggling it to loosen up the Gordian knot that had formed there. Slowly, the space between cold metal and soft hair became bigger, bit by bit. Before the emblem of royalty could fall to the floor, she flipped her hand and caught it between her pointer and middle finger.

“Make yourself presentable, my lord.” She dropped the flame into his waiting arms and watched, secretly charmed, as he put his hair back into place. “The unwashed masses are waiting.”

Mai snapped her fingers at one of the guards by the door, a man so far from an Ozai supporter even Toph had gasped at his honesty when he’d proclaimed during his interview to gladly die for Zuko if the need should arise. (Again, Mai could sympathize.)

“Bring in the next one, the Fire Lord is ready for them.”

Without waiting for Zuko’s approval, the man left to set off another round of, “I’m so sorry about what I did to you when I pretended to be Lee, a normal Earth Kingdom citizen, please take these copious amounts of money and three favors of your choosing to appease my misplaced guilt. Sincerely, Zuko, Idiot and Fire Lord.” Mai had paraphrased a bit, but half of that gibberish was really part of Zuko’s prepared and studied speech, which he got ready to repeat once more.

“You can still leave. Visit Ty Lee, maybe?” he asked her, squaring up as the guard ushered another teenage girl in.

Mai laid her hand on his stiff shoulder, squeezing the tight muscle under her palm.

“Equally boring. I can as well just stay right here.”

After all, someone had to keep an eye on the blushing Earth Kingdom girls.

(Zuko patted her hand upon his person with his own warm, sword-calloused fingers.)

Woe to anyone who dared to assume that she stayed for any other reason.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked the last part :) (though I have to confess the idea of a bonus chapter entered my mind)  
> I’m currently running on fumes, so it would go a long way, motivating me to finish my other projects, to see some of you in the comments.  
> Stay safe, people!


	4. Jin & Song & Lee (feat. Zuko)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonus chapter, y’all!  
> You asked and I deliver, here, right now, the Earth Kingdom kids meeting Fire Lord Zuko, so we’re jumping a bit back and forth in time (also, _scene transition_ ) :P

The guard returned to his post by the door, stoic and silent, leaving Song to walk alone to the middle of the throne room. The black marble under her feet was gleaming, the golden tiles around her reflected light and shadows alike from the wall of flames in front of the raised stage. A detail that shook Song to the core.

Her hard-won courage melted like the candles adorning the walls.

Fire before her, fire beside her – Song was surrounded and her hands began to tremble.

“Dim the flames! Now!”

And suddenly Song wasn’t facing fire as high as the ceiling anymore.

Instead she faced Lee, one of many, the original, hurrying down from the platform, asking while he ran and put out flames with choppy hand movements ( _firebender firebender firebender_ ) if she was okay, and sorry for the fire, it was protocol, and did she want to sit down?

Yes, Song would very much like to sit down right now, and Lee, the Lee who’d started it all, the Fire Lord, oh god, the Fire Lord, called for a chair and steadied her as she took a seat, all the while babbling apologies.

By Oma and–

* * *

SHIT. Shit, shit, shitty shit.

Guessing and puzzling out what was up was apparently still totally different from being confronted with the truth by a crown-wearing Lee, who looked like he wasn’t sure if he should stand up from his throne to greet her or wreck Jin’s nerves from his seat, sneaking peeks at an alarmingly somber girl off to his right in the shadows.

Somber wasn’t good. Somber meant serious shit was going down, and Jin didn’t want shit to go down. Ergo, shit, shit, shitty shit.

At long last deciding what he wanted to do, the Fire Lord stood up, walked through the flames surrounding the stage like a figure straight out of old spirit tales, and ended up a good few feet in front of her, raising his left hand.

“So, uh, hi. You remember me? I mean, sure you remember me, but wrong,” he stuttered. “Um, not Lee here. I’m actually Zuko, Fire Lord Zuko now. Thank you for being gracious enough to follow my invitation.”

… _okay_ , screamed her slack face as Fire Lord Zuko, and wasn’t that a rush, waved at her, which was…

* * *

Awesome!

Lee turned his gift from one side to the other, the blade reflecting his excited face.

“Can I really keep it?” he asked Zuko. “I was so mean to you.”

Since the war’s end, Lee had a lot of time to think, and with Sensu safe and sound at home, he saw things in a new light. Things like how he’d treated the teenager who’d saved him.

Lee had screamed that he hated Zuko, back then not the Fire Lord, but the thought still wasn’t a nice one. You didn’t hurt people who helped you and you sure as dirt didn’t try to hurt the Fire Lord.

His parents had been afraid to let Lee come here because of that, their brief but shared past giving them the willies, but they’d also read him Zuko’s letter while Lee had read between the lines.

He’d really thought about his own behavior and about all the stuff Zuko had done when he was with them. His parents saw the Fire Lord, and Lee saw the teenager who’d clumsily repaired their roof, cuddled his ostrich horse when he thought no one was looking, and saved ungrateful brats from being sent to war by bad guys. So yeah, Lee wasn’t afraid, just nervous Zuko wouldn’t forgive him.

“You were brave. Sometimes that comes with a serving of mean,” Zuko told him, smiling, with a shrug. He nudged the knife’s handle firmer into Lee’s palm. “Keep it, really.”

It was exactly like Lee had thought. The new Fire Lord was _awesome_.

* * *

Jin stood in the hallway, staring at the piece of golden paper in her hand, and asked herself if that really had just happened.

“Excuse me?”

As she lifted her eyes from the paper, she was confronted with the politely inquiring eyes of a sweet-faced Earth Kingdom girl – the vintage hanbok was a dead giveaway.

“Yes?” Jin said, still a bit dazed.

“Do you know if we’re allowed to–” The girl paused. “Are guests allowed to go after an audience or is there something to sign or…” She trailed off, blatantly uncomfortable, tugging on the sides of her dress. “If I was mistaken, I beg your pardon.”

Jin had to smirk. Her own dress was screaming Earth Kingdom peasant in all its forest green and cheaply made glory. “No mistake. I was here for a talk with the Fire Lord, too.”

Automatically, her eyes drifted back to the glittering paper in her hand. “I’m pretty sure we can just go. At least, that way I can’t get any more presents. I’m starting to feel like I’m robbing His Majesty.”

“I understand completely,” the girl sighed. “I’m now in possession of an apothecary and twenty ostrich horses. I thought it was more than enough when I was gifted two, but…” She splayed her hands, helplessly. “What am I even supposed to do with so many ostrich horses? I don’t want an ostrich horse farm!” she half-yelled and clapped her hands over her mouth, shocked by her little outburst.

“I’m sorry for that,” she added, barely above a whisper.

Snickering, Jin shrugged. “No worries. By the way, I’m Jin.”

“Song.” She gracefully inclined her head in greeting.

Jin smiled delighted and held up her slip of paper, dramatically fanning herself with it. “Since today, I’m the proud owner of a coupon for lifelong free tea at the Jasmine Dragon. Didn’t know something like that existed.” She stuffed the coupon into her neckline, patting the cloth hiding it from view. “Plus, the Fire Lord got me an upgrade from the lower ring of Ba Sing Se to the upper ring. Which I don’t complain about, I would be stupid to gripe about that, but it’s a bit excessive for bailing on me after one little kiss.” Flashing a sharp-toothed grin, Jin lowered her voice. “Which wasn’t a hardship, trust me.”

A blush crept up Song’s fair cheeks. “Now I’m a bit jealous,” she whispered as the red hue deepened. “He and I, we just had a moment.”

“Don’t dismiss the power of having a moment. We had one, too, on our date.” Okay, now Jin might be bragging a bit. Though the next second, she had to swallow hard, the gravity of her own statement hitting her. She’d been on a date with the second most important man on earth. “The Fire Lord _juggled_ for me.”

Song blinked. “Was that the moment?”

A laugh burst out of Jin. “God, no. That was just hilarious.”

Fond memories of the boy who’d taken her to dinner, slicked and pressed into shape by his overzealous uncle, overcame her. How he’d tried to impress her, and still hadn’t been able to lie his way out of a cardboard box. He’d been amusing, charming, he’d been a gentleman when it came down to it.

“No. He lit the lanterns at my favorite place for me. Thought I wouldn’t notice how he did it.” Her lips quirked. “Dork.”

“Don’t let someone hear you. This is the Royal Palace,” Song warned her.

“Everyone here is working for him, I’m sure they know by now what a cutie their boss is.”

Tilting her head, Song implored, “And what if the lady in black hears us talking about him?”

Gulping, Jin shuddered. “The one behind the throne? Yeah, she seemed a bit,” Jin wiggled her fingers, “protective of him.”

“I believe I saw her touching a knife strapped to her wrist when Zuko was trying to console me.” Song blanched, the flush painting her cheeks a comely pink receding at an alarming rate.

Sucking in a lungful of air, Jin nodded. “Yeahhh, we probably shouldn’t gush about him here.” Dark girl had been creepy, and very focused on glowering at Jin.

Nudging Song’s elbow with her own, Jin felt the urge to ask, “Want to get a cup of tea with me? Some Fire Nation place where my suspiciously shiny coupon is void.”

Before Song could even entertain the idea of offering to pay herself, Jin lifted a ridiculously full purse from her belt. “It’s still on me.”

Not to be outdone, because the girl had manners, as Jin had already gathered, Song pulled her own full sack of gold from the hidden depths of her dress.

A moment of silence passed between them.

“He really doesn’t know how to do things by halves, huh?”

Jin held the door open, gesturing for Song to go first.

She complied, inclining her head in thanks, and accidentally brushed shoulders with the guard stationed on the outside, who didn’t acknowledge her mumbled apology. Jerk.

A loud laugh a bit further in the distance distracted Jin as she stepped over the threshold. There, a boy was running in front of his parents, brandishing a…was that a knife?

As the door fell into its lock behind them, Jin tried to make sense of the absurdity of an Earth Kingdom kid running around in the Fire Nation capital with a weapon, and why nobody seemed the least bit alarmed by that. Not the guards, not the people around the plaza, not the kid’s parents. What times they lived in now.

“That kid is running around with a knife.”

“That’s Lee,” Song said, her eyes soft.

A Lee with a knife. “Is there a nest?” Jin asked and let loose an ear-splitting _Achoo_ as a wave of pollen blew their way. Spices, spring, flowers in their bloom, and Jin was in allergic hell.

Song, the compassionate angel she was, linked her arm with Jin’s, tugging her forward. “Let’s get you out of here. I saw a nice tea shop on my way from the docks. It seemed cozy.”

After this day, in all its weirdness, a cup of soothing tea in nice company was exactly what Jin needed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The End! Fin! Ende! But for real, this time ;P
> 
> And if you’re in the mood for S2!Zuko cuddling pigs, you might want to check out [Snouts & Sensibility](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26085781), which I posted on Monday.
> 
> Feedback is love, life, and what keeps writers going! Drop me a line, and I’ll sing your praises till the end of time <3


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